picture-35An underground railroad has emerged in Iraq since the start of the United States’ occupation, as Muslim fundamentalists torture, maim and murder LGBT people in that country, The Manchester Guardian’s Peter Tatchell reports.

Since the fall of Saddam Hussein, homophobia and the terrorisation of LGBT people has got much worse. The western invasion of Iraq in 2003 ended the tyrannical Baathist dictatorship. But it also destroyed a secular state, created chaos and lawlessness and allowed the flourishing of religious fundamentalism. The result has been an Islamist-inspired homophobic terror campaign against LGBT Iraqis.

LGBT Iraqis are fleeing to neighboring countries where volunteers set up United Nations asylum status. Already, dozens of gay Iraqis have relocated to the United States, Sweden, the Netherlands and Germany.

This video, “The Sexual Cleansing of Iraq,” documents the connections between the homophobia-related murders and the democratic government of Iraq.